6 Things That Prevent You From Living A Healthy Life

What is happiness? What are the core elements of it?
Every one of us has a unique explanation of this term, thinking about different elements of happiness. Although every person wants to be happy, we often do things that prevent us from living a happier life, even without knowing that.
Any proof needed? Check out these statistics :
Just 31% of Americans are happy
40% of your happiness comes from your intentional activity
36% of employees would give up a part of their salaries to be happier at work.

Being happy is a key to success, and there are ways how to improve the quality of your life.Here comes the list of 6 things that prevent you from living a happier life:

1. Doing Work You Don’t Like

An average person spends about 30% of the life working. Most people would agree that work is a place to earn money, but it takes a considerable amount of your life, so you should love what you do.

The business environment is competitive, so the risk of failures is high. Doing things you don’t like can become a reason of burning out which may negatively affect your well-being and, therefore, reduce your happiness.
If you do for a living something that you love, you don’t track time at work as you’re interested in achieving success. It’s not your duty; it’s not just a source of your income; it’s a sense of your life.

2. Be Afraid of Something

It’s in human’s nature to have fears. To survive, we need to be afraid of dangerous things, but most people have phobias that do nothing but prevent you from living a better life.

To begin with, you should analyze your worries. Once you know what causes your phobia, it’s easier to overcome it. The next step is to know how to deal with stressful factors around you: the fewer causes of stress, the less worried you are.
Benefit from your fears, prove that you’re strong, and live life for full.

3. Don’t Take Care of Yourself

If you believe that taking care of yourself is selfish, you’re mistaken.
Most people claim that they’re pressed for time or money, so looking after themselves is impossible.

Although some beauty procedures can cost an arm and a leg, there are many ways to take care of yourself being on a tight budget: doing physical activities at home, cosmetic procedures, and hugs with beloved are just a few options you have.
Pay attention to your clothes as you can feel more confident if you like how you look. In fact, grooming even stimulates endorphins secretion, and you start fighting stress which means feeling happier.

4. Having Expectations

Have you ever had expectations about people and things around you?
I bet, you had, and I bet, they failed.
Actually, most people tend to have expectations that are forming in our heads while analyzing things around us. Although it’s a result of thoughts and emotions, it’s just a figment of your imagination. Once an expectation is formed, you start thinking it’s real, and then when it fails, you become disappointed and suffer from it.

Once Ryan Reynolds said;
Don’t let your imagination ruin your real life; analyze actions and never try to make up things that may hurt your happiness.

5. Living in the Past

People face different obstacles in a lifetime, and reminiscing about the happy past seems to give us positive emotions.

Actually, you also had problems in the past, but you reflect on good memories only: romances, good relations with old friends, successes, etc.
Thinking about the past causes a lot of pain as you regret about things that came to an end. Living in the past, you are mourning about its happy moments.
The truth is that you don’t let other people and opportunities come into your life. Thus, you don’t enjoy present moments and can’t keep on growing as a person and it prevents you from being happy.

6. Comparing Yourself with Others

Since the early childhood, we compare ourselves to other people for a variety of reasons. We do it even more often when we grow up by comparing our appearance, salaries, success, etc. However, it gives us nothing but worries.

Although it’s hard to stop comparing yourself, it’s important to understand that it’s just a waste of time, efforts, and emotions.

One thing to remember is to stop beating yourself.
All people are unique, and living someone’s else life doesn’t guarantee to be happy. If you can’t get rid of this habit, compare with yourself: analyze what you’ve achieved, set goals, and move forward to them.

The Bottom Line

You’re in charge of your happiness. Once you stop doing things that reduce your happiness, you can start living a better life. The above-mentioned things are common for most people, so you’d better learn them and start working on their overcoming if some of them seem familiar to you.
Are you happy? What is your secret of happiness? Leave a comment below.

About The Author

Lale Byquist is a media communications specialist who runs Presentation Skills a website which share tips on overcoming the fear of public speaking. If you have any suggestions or questions,contact her at lale.byquist@gmail.com